Hyperlocal News + Stories Archives

Monarch Butterflies Are Now Endangered. Here’s Where to See Them Near San Francisco

1Sep

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories, Nature + Climate Crisis, News to Know

Monarch Butterflies Are Now Endangered. Here’s Where to See Them Near San Francisco

Insects are like the canaries in the coal mine in regards to how we can assess the health of ecosystems. When these invertebrates are in healthy, balanced numbers, it’s a sign that said environment is chugging along nicely; conversely, if their numbers are declining rapidly or are ballooning uncontrolled, something’s out of whack. And something is indeed not right with the migratory monarch butterfly as its population counts continue their downward trend. It’s why the species was declared “endangered” back in July by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the global leading authority on the status of biological diversity. Why? Well, populations of the butterfly— which is famous for its twice-yearly, 2,500-mile journey across the continent between its summer and wi...

On Watching Sunsets Fall Atop Presidio Tunnel Tops

1Sep

By Matt Charnock1 Comment

Essays, Feature Pieces, Hyperlocal News + Stories

On Watching Sunsets Fall Atop Presidio Tunnel Tops

It's an exercise in finding gratitude and absorbing enchantments — while celebrating SF’s ‘most hyped’ park in years For the most part, I've healed from the worst, most searing case of burnout I’ve ever experienced in my life — a sullen period marked by a listless numbing over sometime in June. During Pride Month, a time marked by queer frivolity and remembrance, my body felt apathetic to the stimulus around it. Everything began feeling, tasting like ash; the glossy veneer enveloping the career successes I’ve amassed over the past five years began to grow opaque. By the middle of the month, I decided to let the majority of vocational responsibilities I was juggling in the air go uncached. To see what would hit the floor and inevitably bounce back up; allow the weightier, denser, squar...

Francisco Park Is Still Giving ‘Mini Dolores Park’ Energy

1Sep

By Matt CharnockNo Comments

Hyperlocal News + Stories

Francisco Park Is Still Giving ‘Mini Dolores Park’ Energy

And I v much continue to be here for it I've gone to one of San Francisco’s newest City parks — which is among the largest of its kind to open in almost 40 years — almost every single day since it opened this past on a gloomy Wednesday in April. I’ve seen the sunrise here in citrus Pantones; I’ve seen the afternoon blue sky wash over the horizon atop the park’s gorgeous staircases; I’ve witnessed our solar system’s nearest star dip below the Marin Headlands come sundown… while I was planking on a patch of open, green grass. I've planted herbs in the community garden. I completed a thirty-minute HIIT workout on the park’s shouldering steps (that run from Francisco Street to Bay Street down below). I’ve snuggled more dogs than I can count. I saw young humans partake in the blissful merri...

On Crowded Walks Through San Francisco’s Panhandle

25Aug

By Matt Charnock1 Comment

Editors' Picks, Essays, Hyperlocal News + Stories, Nature + Climate Crisis

On Crowded Walks Through San Francisco’s Panhandle

There’s specific happiness in finding yourself in step with strangers. To be a human being means existing in perpetual dichotomy: to juggle two (or three or four or five) juxtapositions in tandem, weighing each notion against the other with muted certainty. My job — cutting teeth and grinding molars, extrapolating reflections and ideas onto the page — lends itself to straddling the line that splits introverted and extroverted activities. I’m inherently, innately, overtly on the side of the former social quality; I’m a reticent individual who can masquerade as a jovial winged insect under blips of manic conviviality for about ninety minutes at a time. But I, too, am a member of a social species. Finding myself amongst kin is as vital to my continued existence on this mortal coil as secur...